EA Festival at the Jockey Club Rooms:
The Fall and Rise of the Stately Home
Tuesday, 30 April 2024
Sponsored by:
The first event in this year’s EA Festival at The Jockey Club Rooms series will be a fascinating event featuring Cambridge professor and historian Peter Mandler and Director General of Historic Houses, Ben Cowell. Peter’s book (of the same title as this event) was the original inspiration for this talk, which will explain the historical vicissitudes leading to the decline, then revitalisation of stately homes in the UK. Ben’s soon-to-be-published book, The British Country House Revival, carries on from where Peter’s left off and emphasises how such places have thrived in recent decades, making this a golden age for houses in the country.
Peter Mandler
Peter is Professor of Modern Cultural History at the University of Cambridge and Bailey Lecturer in History at Gonville and Caius College. His most recent book is The Crisis of the Meritocracy: Britain's Transition to Mass Education since the Second World War (Oxford University Press, 2020) and among his previous books is The Fall and Rise of the Stately Home (Yale University Press, 1997). He is a past president of both the Royal Historical Society and the Historical Association, a Fellow of the British Academy, and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Ben Cowell
Ben Cowell is Director General of Historic Houses, the association that represents over 1,400 independently owned and managed country houses, castles and gardens across the UK (including many in East Anglia). He has previously worked for the National Trust and English Heritage. His latest book, The British Country House Revival will be published in May 2024, and tells the story of the revival in fortunes of country houses since the dark days of the mid-1970s.
The one-hour talk will take place at 12 noon, followed by a glass of champagne and lunch in The Dining Room.
There will be an optional free tour of the Jockey Club Rooms' art collection, arguably the world's finest collection of equine art including paintings by Sir Alfred Munnings and George Stubbs, at 11 am. Places for the tour are limited, so tickets for the tour are mandatory.
Tickets inclusive of a glass of champagne plus set lunch (with one glass of wine) are £75 and tickets for the talk alone are £20. The tour of the art collection is open to all ticket holders.
Event Details